Fish Market owner dies
John Anagnos, above, third from left, owner of City Fish Market in Wethersfield, died Monday at age 77.
WETHERSFIELD – Davina Anagnos loved flying in a helicopter over Glastonbury with her dad John Anagnos.
“He learned how to fly a plane before he learned how to drive a car,” Davina said Tuesday. “He always told us that story. … I loved going with him. It was so much fun. He was at home up there and quite the pilot.”
Anagnos, owner of City Fish Market in Wethersfield, was also at home with everything under the sea. He died Monday at age 77.
John Anagnos, whose grandfather Genos Anagnos founded City Fish Market in 1930, built the company into the brand it is today. Its yellow and white trucks and signature “golden fish hook” bring the creatures of the ocean to restaurants and wholesalers across Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island.
Even into his 70s, John Anagnos could be seen working in the Silas Dean Highway market alongside his children, the fourth generation: George, Michele, Davina and Telly. And like his father before him and his grandfather, John Anagnos’ children and grandchildren have grown up in the fish business.
“My dad really brought it to where it is today,” said Davina Anagnos, the youngest of John Anagnos’ seven children. “He really pushed the business to be more forwardthinking. Change is hard for everyone, but it’s something you have to do to grow.”
The 20,000-square-foot facility includes a market and restaurant as well as frozen storage, cold storage and a 5,000 gallon lobster pound and employs more than 50 people. And it’s those employees John Anagnos genuinely cared about, Davina Anagnos said.
“Just reading the stories on Facebook about the people he touched and saying they never forgot the chance he gave them. He was known for giving people second and third chances. He never gave up on people. He gave them chances when no one else would,” she said.
City Fish Market started on Main Street in Hartford then moved to Front Street before landing in Wethersfield in 1967 at a facility designed by John Anagnos. According to the family’s history John Anagnos began working at the business when he was
9-years-old. By16, he worked the retail counter and also began taking the large trailer truck to New York City’s Fulton Fish Market.
“He would arrive very early in the morning when it was still dark in what was in those days a notoriously dangerous area of NYC.
In those early days, competition was fierce with 20 to 30 other Fish Markets in the Hartford area,” the history on the market’s website notes.
Davina said the “Golden Fish Hook” brand was important to her
father because it symbolizes what the company is all about from wholesale to retail to the restaurants it serves.
“But for him the brand was more than just a logo or picture,” she said. “It was always about giving consistent, quality service. It was his personal guarantee and he stood by it.”
With seven children and 16 grandchildren — many of them still working in the business — Davina said City Fish Market will continue well into the 21st century. She said her father loved the business and did a lot of research about fish and sustainability.
“If he was here, he was working,” she said. “We would tell him to go enjoy your life. We got this. But it was still his business and he was connected to it. It was his life. He had so much integrity. … I know he lived a full life and was happy to the end.”
Calling hours are Thursday from 5-8 p.m. with a funeral planned for Friday at 1-2:30 p.m. at the Glastonbury Funeral Home, 450 New London Turnpike.
Peter Marteka can be reached at pmarteka@courant.com.
“For him the brand was more than just a logo or picture.”
—Davina Anagnos